1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cellular telephone. More specifically, a cellular telephone with a changeable key arrangement is disclosed.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Recently, the price of cellular telephone has been greatly reduced and become affordable to lots of people. It is common that a person owns more than one cellular phone. Some people even replace their cellular telephones as often as they replace their clothes or watches. In another aspect, consumers tend to buy new models instead of old ones. Therefore, cellular telephone manufactures must launch new models with different appearances and styles more frequently so as to draw consumers"" attention and enjoy a more favorable market share.
To change the appearances of cellular telephones, some cellular telephones have been equipped with changeablecovers. However, regardless how the cover is changed, the overall change in appearance is limited because the key arrangements of these cellular phones are still fixed.
The cellular telephone industry, like other industries, has evolved into a vertical market structure. Some manufacturers specialize in design and mass production of cellular phones, while other companies focus on bringing these products to the market using their own brand. These are so called original design manufacture (ODM), or original equipment manufacture (OEM), products. However, to differentiate their products from other competitors, clients usually ask these manufacturers to produce products having greatly different appearances. As a result, to provide new clients with new product appearances, the manufacturers must redesign their products and pass many certification requirements. This is uneconomic and time consuming for these manufactures.
Based upon experiences in product development, it becomes clear to the inventor that the change of appearances of cellular telephones is usually restricted by the key arrangement. If there is an easy and inexpensive way to change the key arrangement of cellular telephones, the mentioned problems could be solved.
Please refer to FIG. 1. FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a conventional cellular telephone 10. The conventional cellular telephone 10 has a housing 12, a printed circuit board 14, and a plurality of keys 16. The printed circuit board 14 has a plurality of key switches 18 for interacting with the plurality of keys 16 to generate corresponding key-pressing signals. The arrangement of the keys 16 must be the same as the arrangement of the key switches 18. Conventionally, if it is desired that the key arrangement be changed, the key switch arrangement must first be changed. That means the circuitry of the printed circuit board 14 must be changed as well, i.e. a new circuit board is required. As the printed circuit board 14 is usually a rigid circuit board, and has a high cost, it is not economical to change the key arrangement.
It is therefore a primary objective of this invention to provide a cellular telephone that can easily and economically change its key arrangement.
The present invention, briefly summarized, discloses a cellular telephone having a housing, a first circuit board installed in the housing, and a second circuit board installed above the first circuit board. The housing has a plurality of keys arranged in a first manner. The first circuit board is a rigid printed circuit board having a first connector on an upper side of the first circuit board. The second circuit board is below the plurality of keys. The second circuit board has a plurality of key switches arranged in the first manner for interacting with the plurality of keys to generate corresponding key-pressing signals, and a second connector detachably connected with the first connector for transmitting the key-pressing signals. The second circuit board is changeable so that keys arranged in different patterns can be installed onto the housing.
It is an advantage of the present invention that the key arrangement can be easily changed by changing the second circuit board instead of the first circuit board. Thus, manufacturers and users can design or use cellular telephones with greater flexibility, as needed.
These and other objectives of the present invention will no doubt become obvious to those of ordinary skill in the art after reading the following detailed description of the preferred embodiment, which is illustrated in the various figures and drawings.